As the first chief prosecutor for the tribunals, Goldstone helped shepherd the proceedings, the first of their kind since Nazi war criminals were tried at Nuremberg following World War II. In 1995, he filed charges of genocide and crimes against humanity against Bosnian Serb leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic for their roles in the ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Muslims, the shelling of Sarajevo, and the sacking of mosques and Catholic churches in Bosnia. Prior to his appointment, Goldstone chaired the Commission of Inquiry Regarding Public Violence and Intimidation, more commonly known as "the Goldstone Commission," following the dismantling of the apartheid regime in his native South Africa.

"As chief prosecutor of the...tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, Justice Goldstone displayed a mature, meticulous, and measured exercise of his mandate that reanimated the enterprise of international justice, bringing both a degree of resolution to victims and a new model for the prosecution of crimes against humanity," said MacArthur Foundation president Jonathan Fanton. "Insisting on the independence of the counsel and judges, a transparent establishment of the facts in each case, due-process protections for the accused, and the centrality of firsthand testimony from witnesses and surviving victims, he gave the tribunals moral authority and legal credibility."